“Chastened” and “subdued” are words not to be found in the lexicon of just ousted US President Donald Trump. That is why even after having been acquitted on 13 February of inciting the horrific attack on the US Capitol after a historic impeachment trial, he is belligerent, pugnacious and unrepentant, even though his acquittal was primarily based on “technical” reasons. He has been spared the first-ever conviction of a US President, but the trial proceedings have laid bare the fragility of America’s democratic traditions. The country now stands as divided as it was before the polls and unable to come to terms with the violence sparked by his defeated presidency.
In less than a month since the barbaric January 6 vandalism at the Capitol, America’s citadel of democracy, by rampaging Trump supporters the Senate convened for a rare weekend session to deliver its verdict. Trump was accused of inciting the violence. The acquittal gives him a historic second victory in the court of impeachment as his first impeachment trial over l’affaire Ukraine had similarly failed.
The quick trial, the nation’s first of a former President, showed with the help of video footage as evidence how Trump’s supporters nearly overturned the verdict of the Presidential race in favour of Joe Biden. From outside the White House, Trump unleashed a mob of supporters to “fight like hell” for him at the Capitol just the as Congress was proceeding to certify Biden’s victory.
It was apparent from the beginning that the acquittal was but a formality since the required threshold of two-thirds votes was virtually impossible to achieve. The final count of 57-43, which was 10 votes short, confirmed it.
Emerging unscathed Trump immediately went on the offensive telling the world he has forgotten nothing, learnt nothing. He welcomed the verdict and declared his movement “has only just begun.” He slammed the trial as “yet another phase of the greatest witch hunt in the history of our Country.”
The truth is, however, that though he was acquitted of the sole charge of incitement of insurrection, it was easily the largest number of senators to ever vote to find a President of their own party guilty of an impeachment count of high crimes and misdemeanors.
Voting to find Trump guilty were GOP Senators Richard Burr of North Carolina, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Patrick Toomey of Pennsylvania.
Even after voting to acquit, the Republican leader Mitch McConnell condemned the former president as ‘practically and morally responsible’ for the insurrection. Trump could not be convicted, he pleaded, because he did not believe convicting an ex-president was constitutional. Nevertheless, he aptly summed up Trump’s true predicament when he said his acquittal doesn’t mean he can’t be tried under the country’s criminal laws.
His most encouraging words are that the Senate’s decision “does not condone” anything that happened on or before “that terrible day.”
“It simply shows that senators did what the former President failed to do. We put our constitutional duty first.”
Though Trump triumphed this time as well, democracy did become victorious as a big majority in the Senate was convinced of the Democrats’ case as was reflected in the number of votes.
As President Biden said that the final vote did not lead to a conviction, but the substance of the charge is not in dispute.
Trump’s attorney Michael van der Veen may find solace from the fact that he was found not guilty, but it was no mean feat that seven of his own Senators didn’t exonerate him of the charge.
The verdict signals Trumpism survives. The USA will have to learn to live with it or erase it from its political discourse and national psyche. The country has to be vigilant so that it doesn’t revive as it still has the backing of nearly half the population. The outcome after the uprising leaves unresolved the nation’s wrenching divisions over Trump’s brand of politics that led to the most violent domestic attack on one of America’s three branches of government. One of the House prosecutors rightly concluded that the Senators were in a dialogue with history and having a conversation with the country’s past “with a hope for our future.” Whatever was done by the Senators for carrying the impeachment trial to its logical conclusion, they and the moment will be preserved for posterity.
Not only that, realisation has dawned across the world that the GOP is still steeped in Trumpism. Four years is a very short time.